Phase I flight testing

[High Country 69]

Well after two weeks of flight testing I'm at 28.XX hrs on the hobbs and have been having a blast. I'm seeing 1000 fpm at 60 mph climb out with myself and full fuel and 500 fpm with full fuel and 185 lbs strapped in the right seat. Average cruise is 75 mph but I don't have any fairings or gap seals anywhere so I expect that to increase as I clean it up. Fuel burn has been right at 4gal/hr which is better than I expected. here are a couple pics of my adventures so far. 

Edited 18 Oct 2014 by High Country

[1avidflyer 1983]

Looks real nice.  Would mention one thing though, I think there was an AD or at least a strong suggestion to put the wood fairings on the lift struts to stiffen them.  On Kitfoxs, some have reported 10 - 12 MPH increase in speed with the struts faired.  One question, was something added to the rib tails that the flaperon hinges on?  They look a bit different than others I've seen.  Jim Chuk

Edited 18 Oct 2014 by Jim Chuk

[dynomike 91]

looks great in the air .looks like you have shorter flaperons.

[EDMO 1078]

Congrats Robert,

      Bird looks good, and must fly good too - many more adventurous hours ahead for you.

Jim,

      The rib ends look like the speedwing rib ends, and they are heavier than the stol rib ends - but I could be wrong.

EDMO

[High Country 69]

Jim- I've heard it both ways regard the structural integrity of the lift struts with vs w/o the wood fairings I'm going to change them soon to either 7/8 or 1" and will Fair them then just wanted to start flying it in the mean time. the rib tails were plated with aluminum all the way up into the webbing of the ribs for reinforcement. 

 

Mike- the Flapperons are short because I used heavy hauler spars (3' longer) and HH / specs but used speed wing rib profile and have not yet extended the flapperons to match it. I did add the rib tail out there for extending them in the future though. 

[EDMO 1078]

Robert,

       Your flaperons would be more efficient if you could just add some tube at the root end and move them out the extra bay for now.

EDMO

[High Country 69]

that sounds like a good idea Ed problem is I built them off of an old print and it wound up being that the 1st rib was set aprox 1/4" further out than it should have been and the rest were measured off of it making the gap at the outer end 1/4" shorter so the hinges don't line up. I planning to just make a whole new set later and will probably use the symmetrical design Kitfox has gone to. also want to shorten up the arms that the push pull cables attach to so I have less stick movement for more flapperon movement. this will all come in time for now they seem to be working just fine

 

-Robert-

[akflyer 1427]

Looks great and glad your ahving fun flying it!

 

FWIW, there is a service bulletin that Avid put out on the wood fairings.. the directive basically says it has come to thier attention that some builders have left the fairings off and that they should be installed in the next 25 hrs.. this is for negative loads, not positive.  So as long as your not doing any outside snaps, you should be fine.  I picked up 250 FPM climb when I put the fairings on mine.  I went to 1" lift struts so I could use the KF snap on fairings, but they are HEAVY!  I would make some out of .020 aluminum for the 1" struts to save weight!

 

[EDMO 1078]

Robert,

      Wouldn't it be feasible to just make a spacer to take care of that 1/4" gap??

EDMO

[C5Engineer 1170]

Exciting times! The extended wings I have seen have the flaperon missing on the fuse end and then they run out to the tips. Kitfox doesn't use the wood fairing for stiffening and yes the plastic they sell will add 10lbs but it makes a huge performance difference as others have mentioned.

[birddog486 21]

Congrats Robert,

 

I assume you have the same wing I built which can be considered an extended aerobat speedwing. I'm curious on your stall speed and how much washout you built into the wing also whats your empty weight on that beauty

 

Travis

[Luked 71]

Good job Robert! It's nice to see another Avid take to the skies. Thanks for posting pics.

[cliff 45]

Congrats on your accomplishment.  I too, recently got an old Avid back in the air and share your enthusiasm  I am very interested to know the answers that birddog486 asked. I have a project mark 4 with speed wings that I have an airdale extension kit for and your experience will help me decide how much wash out to rebuild into my wings. Have fun and be safe.

 

 Thanks Cliff

[High Country 69]

Thanks again for the compliments, My wife and I are very happy with it so far and have big hopes of seeing better performance with a few change. To answer all the questions specs are as follows

 

Wings- HH spars (12' .083 wall) built with speed wing rib profile spaced 12" per the HH prints. the only exception of ribs is that 2-3 were removed for the fuel tanks and rib #4 is a second transitional root rib. this enabled me to use the new ethanol proof HH wing tanks (nobody makes speedwing tanks anymore) and I ran false rib cap strips along the bottom of the tank where rib's 2-3 would have been to keep the flat bottom, the tops of the tanks are high like the HH and it just tapers down between rib 4-5 to the speed wing profile. the washout is set to 1 1/2" per the speedwing prints but if I was doing it again I would probably just use 1/2" as the newer KF's have gone to. We currently have the original lift struts non faired but are planning to make some 1" struts and fair them in the next couple weeks this will increase the structural integrity and clean it up at the same time. 

 

Flapperons- currently the shorter speedwing flapperons which are performing ok but I will eventually make new ones that are 3' longer and I will use a symmetrical airfoil as KF has gone to. I also want to shorten up the horns that attach to the mixer so less stick movement makes more flapperon movement. 

 

Flapperon Mixer- I have cut the mixer out from behind the seat giving me a completely open baggage area. We turned the main mixer on its side and relocated it under the left seat then ran teleflex cables up to the flapperons (this is just a slightly modified version of how the fat avids were done) I think we gained a little "play" doing this conversion thats why I would like to shorten up the horns on the flapperons to take some of it out. 

 

Tail- We added a dorsal fin to the vertical stabilizer and have gone to the MK IV elevator with electric trim and MK IV rudder. (still have to add gap seals) 

 

Landing gear- the Main gear legs are from Ridge Runner and I made a custom cabane to make them work this gave me 8' from outside to outside of the Nanco 21x12x8 tires. It rides very stable and I prefer the Bungee suspension over the spring suspension.  (Bungees would be a very easy/cheap conversion for those of you running the spring gear that just want bungees instead) 

 

Engine- Basic gray head DCDI 582 with pull start pre mix fuel Lucas semi synthetic mixed 50:1. GSC 3 blade wood prop pitched at 12* 

 

Overall this plane is still very "dirty" with no gap seals or fairings anywhere but we are planning to clean it up a lot in the near future to help with performance. 

 

Empty weight 527 lbs. Gross 1050

 

with myself 155 lbs full fuel 26 gal I'm seeing 1000 fpm climb at 60 mph and with an added 185 lbs im seeing 500 fpm at 60 mph Cruise is around 75 mph at 5800-6000 stall no flaps 50 (haven't played with the flaps much to determine stall w/ flaps yet) it sure hops off the ground fast with full flaps I'm shooting base at 70 and final at 60 power to idle as I cross the numbers then its a very smooth transition to the ground. 

 

Currently at 30.1 hrs almost out of Phase I

[akflyer 1427]

I think if your going to extend the flaperons I would do that BEFORE I made a new arm to give you more throw and see what you think.  When the flaperons go out to the tips, they are going to respond much better.  The extended speed wing I flew was really light and sporty on the roll but the flaperons were moved out to the tip rib and he used a piece of tubing to extend the tube into the cabin area.  He did not lengthen the flaperon itself, just moved it out.  You can flip the L shaped piece around that comes off the control stick and get more movement with less stick input, but I don't like the heavier control forces that causes.  I think when you move the flaperon out you will gain all the roll response you want.

 

[cliff 45]

Could you post some pictures of your mixing system and flex cables?   Sounds interesting, and thank you for your wing wash out opinion. It will be a while until we get back to work on the mark 4 project but I am continually learning from you guys and taking notes.